Wood Burner Quotes

Now toasted cheese is a temptation few men can resist, be they charcoal burners or kings. John Uskglass reasoned thus: all of Cumbria belonged to him – therefore this wood belonged to him – therefore this toasted cheese belonged to him.

The various objects for the decoration of a room should be so selected that no colour or design shall be repeated. If you have a living flower, a painting of flowers is not allowable. If you are using a round kettle, the water pitcher should be angular. A cup with a black glaze should not be associated with a tea-caddy of black lacquer. In placing a vase of an incense burner on the tokonoma, care should be taken not to put it in the exact centre, lest it divide the space into equal halves. The pillar of the tokonoma should be of a different kind of wood from the other pillars, in order to break any suggestion of monotony in the room.

This astonished us as children, for we grew up beside the charcoal burners, called them by their Christian names, watched them at work, visited them in their log huts when they were ill; but to my mother, the bailiff’s daughter from St. Christophe, gently nurtured, educated and well spoken, the rude shouts of these wild men of the woods at midnight must have sounded like devils in hell.

In 1846 Easter fell on the same date in the Latin and Greek Orthodox calendars, so the holy shrines were much more crowded than usual, and the mood was very tense. The two religious communities had long been arguing about who should have first right to carry out their Good Friday rituals on the altar of Calvary inside the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, the spot where the cross of Jesus was supposed to have been inserted in the rock. During recent years the rivalry between the Latins and the Greeks had reached such fever pitch that Mehmet Pasha, the Ottoman governor of Jerusalem, had been forced to position soldiers inside and outside the church to preserve order. But even this had not prevented fights from breaking out. On this Good Friday the Latin priests arrived with their white linen altar-cloth to find that the Greeks had got there first with their silk embroidered cloth. The Catholics demanded to see the Greeks’ firman, their decree from the Sultan in Constantinople, empowering them to place their silk cloth on the altar first. The Greeks demanded to see the Latins’ firman allowing them to remove it. A fight broke out between the priests, who were quickly joined by monks and pilgrims on either side. Soon the whole church was a battlefield. The rival groups of worshippers fought not only with their fists, but with crucifixes, candlesticks, chalices, lamps and incense-burners, and even bits of wood which they tore from the sacred shrines. The fighting continued with knives and pistols smuggled into the Holy Sepulchre by worshippers of either side. By the time the church was cleared by Mehmet Pasha’s guards, more than forty people lay dead on the floor.1

One further complication in the link between self-sufficiency and simplicity is worth noting. Self-sufficiency may be part of the traditional notion and the Romantic ideal of simple living, but in fairly obvious ways using technology can simplify our lives considerably. Which is simpler, washing all your clothes and sheets by hand, or using a washing machine? Collecting and chopping wood to make a fire to cook over, or turning on the gas burner and pushing the electric ignition button? Walking across town and back to deliver a message, or making a phone call? The point here is that the concept of simple living contains crosscurrents. Reducing our dependence on infrastructure and technology may bring us closer to simple living in one sense—we are more self-sufficient—but takes us away from it in other ways since it makes basic tasks much more difficult, arduous, and time-consuming. And in some ways technology can even help us to be more self-sufficient, as when we use a washing machine to do our own laundry instead of using servants or sending it out.

She shifted her voice into a lilting, sweet croon. “I’m looking for custom ash-wood floors, seven-by-seven pieces?” “One moment, please.” Another ring. Then another female said, “This is Custom Ash-Wood Floors, Seven by Seven.” Lidia let out a small breath. She had only called once before, long ago. They’d sent her burner phone after burner phone, in case of an emergency. Each month she’d destroyed them, unused. Well, this was an emergency. “This is Daybright,” she said in her normal voice. The female on the line sucked in a breath. “Solas.” Lidia continued quickly, “I need all agents mobilized and ready to move in three days.” The female on the line cleared her throat. “I … Agent Daybright, I don’t think there’s anyone to mobilize.” Lidia blinked slowly. “Explain.” “We’ve taken too many hits, lost too many people. And after the death of Agent Silverbow, a good number abandoned the cause.” “How many are left?” “A couple hundred, perhaps.” Lidia closed her eyes. “And none can be spared right now to—” “Command’s put an end to all missions. They’re going into hiding.” “Patch me through to Command, then.” “I … I’m not authorized to do that.” Lidia opened her eyes. “Tell Command I’ll speak to them and only them. This information is something that might buy them a shot at survival.” The dispatcher paused, considering. “If it’s not—” “It is. Tell them it’s about something they’ve wanted to do for a very long time.” Another pause. Thinking through all she knew, probably. “One moment.

I woke up as the first light began to bring an orange glow to the tops of the whispering pines (and sky) above me at 5:43 but lay still to avoid waking Hope for another half-hour. She had suffered through a tough and mostly sleepless night, and I wanted to give her every second I could as the next week promised to be very stressful for her (and me), and that was if everything went according to plan. At a few minutes after six, she either sensed the growing light or my wakefulness and shifted to give me a wet kiss. We both moved down towards the slit in the bottom of my Hennessy hammock and dropped out and down onto the pine needles to explore the morning. Both of us went a ways into the woods to take care of early morning elimination, and we met back by the hammock to discuss breakfast. I shook out some Tyler kibble (a modified GORP recipe) for me and an equal amount of Hope’s kibble for her. As soon as we had scarfed down the basic snack, we picked our way down the sloping shore to the water’s edge, jumped down into the warm water (relative to the cool morning air at any rate) for a swim as the sun came up, lighting the tips of the tallest pines on the opposite shore. Hope and I were bandit camping (a term that I had learned soon after arriving in this part of the world, and enjoyed the feel of), avoiding the established campsites that ringed Follensby Clear Pond. We found our home for the last seventeen days (riding the cooling August nights from the full moon on the ninth to what would be a new moon tonight) near a sandy swimming spot. From there, we worked our way up (and inland) fifty feet back from the water to a flat spot where some long-ago hunter had built/burned a fire pit. We used the pit to cook some of our meals (despite the illegality of the closeness to the water and the fire pit cooking outside an approved campsite … they call it ‘bandit camping’ for a reason). My canoe was far enough up the shore and into the brush to be invisible even if you knew to look for it, and nobody did/would/had. After we had rung a full measure of enjoyment out of our quiet morning swim, I grabbed the stringer I had anchored to the sandy bottom the previous afternoon after fishing, pulled the two lake trout off, killed them as quickly/painlessly/neatly as I could manage, handed one to Hope, and navigated back up the hill to our campsite. I started one of the burners on my Coleman stove (not wanting to signal our position too much, as the ranger for this area liked morning paddles, and although we had something of an understanding, I didn’t want to put him in an uncomfortable position … we had, after all, been camping far too long in a spot too close to the water). Once I had gutted/buttered/spiced the fish, I put my foil-wrapped trout over the flame (flipping and moving it every minute or so, according to the sound/smell of the cooking fish); Hope ate hers raw, as is her preference. It was a perfect morning … just me and my dog, seemingly alone in the world, doing exactly what we wanted to be doing.

Look here, he says, what's the matter with you fellows? let's get cracking with this dump. Your road is bad; pave it. Better yet, build a paved road to every corner of the park; better yet, pave the whole damned place so any damn fool can drive anything anywhere is this a democracy or ain't it? Next, charge a good stiff admission fee; you can't let people in free; that leads socialism and regimentation. Next, get rid of all these homely rangers in their Smokey the Bear suits. Hire a crew of pretty girls, call them rangerettes, let them sell the tickets and give the campfire talks. And advertise, for godsake, advertise! How do you expect to get people in here if you don't advertise? Next, these here Arches light them up. Floodlight them, turn on colored, revolving lights -jazz it up, man, it's dead. Light up the whole place, all night long, get on a 24-hour shift, keep them coming, keep them moving, you got two hundred million people out there waiting to see your product-is this a free country or what the hell is it? Next your campgrounds, you gotta do something about your camp grounds, they're a mess. People can't tell where to park their cars or which spot is whose-you gotta paint lines, numbers, mark out the campsites nice and neat. And they're still building fires on the ground, with wood! Very messy, filthy, wasteful. Set up little grills on stilts, sell charcoal briquettes, better yet hook up with the gas line, install jets and burners. Better yet do away with the camp. grounds altogether, they only cause delay and congestion and administrative problems-these people want to see America, they're not going to see it sitting around a goddamned campfire; take their money, give them the show, send them on their way-that's the way to run a business....

Visual access to kitchen: There is nothing quite like being able to look into a restaurant’s kitchen and watch your food being prepared. The open burners, or the glow emanating from a wood-fired pizza oven, harken back to ancient times and offer a sense of hearth and home. There is also something both reassuring and entertaining about watching a busy kitchen as you await your food. Personally I find kitchens with no visual access disconcerting. Consider whether some visual access to the kitchen from your dining room might further your concept.

Josh: There's no rush to figure it out. Ashley: Do you back-burner everything in your life until it's convenient? .... You seem to me to epitomize the concept of putting everything off until tomorrow. Josh: And you never put anything off. Maybe I'm just trying to lead you to a middle ground. The truth is, we tend to make our own chaos. Sure, the real world has deadlines, and they're important. But we turn everything into a "must do" crisis. Not everything needs to be done immediately. We can take the pressure off ourselves. We can choose not to participate in the rat race. All it takes is recognizing our own limits, prioritizing, and learning to say no. It was just as he'd try to tell her: answers came as soon as a person stopped trying to force them.

Josh: There's no rush to figure it out. Ashley: Do you back-burner everything in your life until it's convenient? .... You seem to me to epitomize the concept of putting everything off until tomorrow. Josh: And you never put anything off. Maybe I'm just trying to lead you to a middle ground. The truth is, we tend to make our own chaos. Sure, the real world has deadlines, and they're important. But we turn everything into a "must do" crisis. Not everything needs to be done immediately. We can take the pressure off ourselves. We can choose not to participate in the rat race. All it takes is recognizing our own limits, prioritizing, and learning to say no. It was just as he'd try to tell her: answers came as soon as a person stopped trying to force them. (From The Laws of Attraction)

White floorboards, TV, wood-burner, electric piano, two new laptops on charge, a mahogany chest on which perched an ornate chess set, nicely stacked bookshelves.